5 Serious (& 1 Lighthearted) Legal Web Marketing Predictions for 2015

Where is legal web marketing headed in 2015? Do we need to prep for any upcoming roadblocks? What about exciting changes to anticipate? Are there any new technologies that will help the industry?

If these are questions you’ve been asking, I’m right there with you. When I have legal marketing questions, I turn to the expertise of my teammates at Consultwebs.com. I asked their predictions as to where legal web marketing is headed in 2015.

Here’s what they said.

Ashley KrohnOutreach Specialist@tweetinash

Mobile will continue to grow. Your site MUST be optimized for mobile in 2015.

There will be a great focus on the user: understanding who they are, what content they consume, and how they view it.

We will see more personalized, targeted content marketing. Content will be optimized towards the purchase funnel, or the journey a visitor will take on your site, in whatever format works best for your audience.

Watch Reddit. If your audience is there, then you would be wise to start putting resources there.

Mike Dayton, J.D.Manager of Content Services@senorpibb

The message for content is moving toward: “Go deep!” Google is rewarding longer, substantive articles and website sections. Our Content Team will continue its emphasis on resource sections that signal our clients’ authority and expertise in their practice area niches.

My prediction is that mobile technology will become even more of an important tool that law firms (and all businesses) will use to connect with their clientele. Not just for lead generation and online search, but also case management, client payments, and communication.

Jennifer FrameLocal SEO Specialist@jmframe

I think we’ll see even more importance placed on mobile friendly sites. Google launched a mobile friendly checker last month, google.com/webmasters/tools/mobile-friendly, and results that get a passing grade will have a mobile friendly badge next to their name in results. This is yet another hint to site owners that mobile is of critical importance and that Google is rewarding the sites that are mobile friendly.

Derek SeymourSenior Web Engineer@derekseymour

As far as web technological shifts in 2015, I predict we’ll see a trend towards statically-generated websites (as opposed to dynamically-generated, such as WordPress). Much of the power and functionality given to dynamically-generated sites today is being outweighed by slow performance, security risks, and a barrage of product updates. Static sites, however, tend to be much cleaner, respond extremely quickly, and help minimize the amount of vulnerabilities available to hackers. In addition, tools for static sites have come a long way in recent months and many of the common features found in sites can now be implemented using HTML/CSS/JavaScript libraries and frameworks in conjunction with the method of generating static sites known as ‘compiling.’ While some limitations remain, the barriers to building static sites are quickly going away with the plethora of resources available and we’re likely to see an increasing number of businesses and professionals taking advantage of this in the coming year.